As personal computers, laptop computers and individual workstations continue to propagate and populate desktops and laptops, more and more information is being processed on display screens which are visible to anyone in the general area who happens to pass by near the display. Most applications being worked on the computer screens contain sensitive information and even confidential information which should not be displayed for public viewing. Nevertheless, there is no effective means for hiding such information from public display when a user is working the application.
In certain environments, this need is endemic. For example, in work areas where there are large areas of individual data processing stations, there is a need to protect at least portions of displayed data from curious unauthorized eyes. For example, it is necessary to protect displayed information from public view in most hospital registration areas, banks, airline terminals, research centers and military installations. Existing security safeguards are not entirely effective in many applications where information is made available only on a “need-to-know” basis. In many environments, system screen “lock-outs” including screen blocks or masks, to the extent they are effective at all, are only effective if the operator turns on the screen lockout feature and such means are not effective at all while the operator is working on a displayed application. Privacy screen overlays are also not effective especially when an operator leaves a workstation and unauthorized personnel are able to view a display screen by merely changing their viewing angle only slightly.
Existing techniques that mask fields in a displayed form with asterisks or other symbols, such as those used for passwords, are ineffective and subject to operator error since the typed-in values cannot be visually verified, and the user interface needs to resort to redundant fields, for example, one field to enter a password and a second field to confirm the password.
Thus, there is a need for an improved methodology and system for enabling selective viewing of information presented on a display device.